Tuesday, November 15, 2016

I just can't take it anymore. I should have moved on long back but lingered in the hopes of a miracle. It was not to be and I've finally given up hope. The writing was always on the wall but I pretended not to read. Reality cannot be overlooked anymore.
It's painful but it must be done. The neglect is too much.
Google seems to have completely forgotten that it owns Blogger. Google bought the pioneer in the field of blogging and allowed it to languish while WordPress happened out of nowhere and thrived under the sun. While wordPress does come with a few caveats of its own, they diminish in comparison to Google's step-motherly treatment of Blogger.
Leaving behind a blogging platform is like junking your most trafficked mail id - you just can't get away from it completely. So while Blogger will always remain the mother ship, WordPress is where I may do at least some of my next few posts. In the long run, all posts will be come to Blogger, but not before WordPress has hosted them for some time.

Sunday, November 13, 2016

Saturday, November 12, 2016

I'm listening to Louis Armstrong on Spotify. Arihant rushes into the room with a torch that was originally meant to project images of planets, nebulae and galaxies on the wall. Ever since he lost the films, it's reduced to a vanilla torch that projects a featureless circle on the wall. Ari croons a song on the planets, hopelessly out of tune and factually utterly incorrect. He now begs for his telescope, a request I reject owing to the clouds.

I look at my 4yr old & think...
Why do we need God when there are children around?
Why do we chant when there are giggles abound?
Why do we preach when love has been found?
Dearest Ari, to you I'm forever bound.

Tuesday, November 08, 2016

We are what we post on our social networks. I guess life was meaningless before social networking came along to define us. Just imagine the meaninglessness our forefathers endured in the oblivion of FB.
But we are the enlightened ones. Lucky us. We post like crazy. Every moment spent on experiencing anything not worthy of a post is not worthy of the experience in the first place. And since we somehow don't live the enriched lives we envisaged for ourselves, plagiarizing the thoughts and opinions of others is what these networks is all about. Rarely do I come across a post that isn't a repost or a post not flattering oneself. What a severe paucity of a genuine appreciation for life.

Tuesday, July 26, 2016

My heart bleeds for Yahoo. The iconic company, which was once synonymous with the web is no more the independent Internet company it once was.

Being a portal was all the rage before the dot-com bust. After the bubble burst, Yahoo suffered from an identity crisis, much like the now-forgotten portals Excite and Lycos. Yahoo weather the storm much better than its competitors, but the new era didn't belong to portals, it belonged to specialists like Google and Facebook. Yahoo watched from the sidelines as it missed one opportunity after the other.

A spate of clueless CEO's didn't help either. Marissa Mayer was an expensive and promising hire as CEO of a sinking ship. Many people saw her as the only hope. The hopes were soon to be dashed. The identity crisis perpetuated under her and Yahoo's stocks continued to tumble. Expensive acquisitions were made in the hopes of reviving Yahoo's fortunes, but the company simply didn't know how to manage its acquisitions.

All attempts to revive the behemoth were finally laid to rest when the board invited offers to be bought. Verizon finally purchased it for a meager $4.8 billion. Compare this to being worth $125 billion not too long back and a $44 billion spurned offer to be bought outright by Microsoft.

Tuesday, June 28, 2016

Life is multi-lingual. It constantly talks to you in many languages. Out of all these languages that you can hear, the one you choose to listen to depends on the language you learnt.Most people attain great fluency in hatred. The language of love, it would seem, is left to the animals.

Friday, June 24, 2016

UK has just decided to leave the EU. I'm happy but nervous for what lies immediately ahead though the long-term prospects look good. Bidding adieu to Europe kinda makes me feel sad, I must confess.

On a very different note, after having already converted Bitcoins into Pounds, Dollars and Euros, I converted the cryptocurrency into Indian Rupees today.
Fintech has come far. I've dabbled in 6 currencies in the last 1 week, 7 overall.

Monday, June 13, 2016

These are not the best of times for me, ma or didi.
Didi endured a major operation recently. Life since then hasn't been very easy.
Ma, whose condition seems to be the most precarious, is mercifully oblivious to her own condition. It's actually the distress others face that worries me the most. I wonder how long we can pull through and how painful the end will be. I'm consumed in thinking how unfortunate it has been that a cruel twist of fate has robbed her and the people around her so many moments of normal living. Even a semblance of normalcy would be a great relief. My pain consumes me.
I have my own issues, mostly within. It's a conflict I seem to be losing.
Why did dad have to leave so soon?

Saturday, June 11, 2016

I won't pretend I was familiar with the name. I wasn't. Christina Grimmie was a rising YouTube star, one of the many people who gained quick fame due to the fact that the Internet empowers people to reach far and wide without a marketing push. People sat up and took notice of the talented singer. She didn't need an entire army of musicians and back-up singers to carry her through. The keyboard was enough. She deserved all the accolade. This is even more commendable when I see the number of vanity-filled wannabe stars trying their luck at talent shows. I'm surprised the judges have managed not to slip into coma after years and years of mental assault with their talentless performances. Christina Grimmie was sheer talent. The world was warming up to her treating her just right.

But something did go tragically wrong for her. Someone pulled the trigger at a concert and killed her before turning the gun on himself and meeting the same fate. Now I have no trouble accepting people's right to end their own life. You have every right to end your miserable life if you so desire. In fact, I'll go to the extent of endorsing euthanasia in the developed world. It would be subject to abuse in the developing world, thus my reservations.

But you have no right to kill someone else, no matter what the reason, the only exception being self-defense. Which is why I have a problem with American gun control policies. Some people will always be crazy and do stupid things, pulling the trigger for instance. And when buying a gun over-the-counter is as easy as taking a bath, innocent people will keep falling victim to the delusions of the crazy. History repeats itself only because we choose not to learn from it.

Christina Grimmie, all of 22, had her beautiful life cut short. If there is life after death, Christina, I hope you're at peace.